San Jose-based Acer America Corp yesterday announced AcerNote Light, its new line of Pentium processor notebooks (CI No 2,896) which will sell for between $2,000 and $2,500. It also announced AcerPower, a new range of desktop and minitower personal computers for multimedia and business applications. Available in 14 configurations, the AcerPower machines come with Pentium processors clocked at 100Mhz to 166Mhz, 1.2Gb to 2Gb hard disk, 2Mb to 4Mb VRAM or 1Mb to 2Mb DRAM and 256Kb cache. They come with Windows 95, Microsoft NT or Windows for Workgroups. Prices for the desktops start at between $1,275 to $2,750 with minitowers starting at between $1,350 and $3,225, 5%-15% below similarly configured systems offered by Hewlett-Packard Co and Compaq Computer Corp, claims Acer. Acer has signed a distribution agreement Mississauga, Ontario-based Globelle Corp which recently merged with long-time Acer distributor, Berlin, New Jersey-based GBC. Acer also announced new versions of its Pentium-based AcerAltos servers. The entry-level Series 900 is designed as a small application server or intranet web server for up to 75 users. It comes with a single 133MHz Pentium, 512Kb cache, 16Mb to 192Mb RAM, 4Gb disk, four PCI and three EISA slots, PCI SCSI-3 controller, CD-ROM and 1Mb VRAM. It costs from $3,000. The mid- range AcerAltos 9000 is designed to support up to 150 users and comes with one or two 166MHz Pentiums, 512Kb cache, 32Mb to 256Mb RAM, up to 4Gb disk, five PCI slots, three EISA slots, eight drive bays, PCI SCSI controller and CD-ROM. Prices range from $5,000 to $13,500. The AcerAltos 19000 is designed to support up to 250 users. It supports one of Acer’s one- or two-way 200MHz Pentium Pro boards with the Intel Orion chipset, 256Kb cache, 32Mb to 512Mb RAM, up to 8Gb disks, six PCI and three EISA slots, PCI SCSI controller, CD-ROM, 14 drive bays and redundant power supply. Prices go from $12,000 to $25,000. All come with Acer StartUp and Server Manager Pro software plus SCO OpenServer, NetWare or NT Server.
